Dorangel Vargas
Written By: ML
Edited By: Grave Reviews Staff
Early Life
Jose Dorangel Vargas Gomez was born to a farmer family on May 14, 1957 in Merida, Venezuela. During his childhood and early teens, he was already showing strange behavior. His first two arrests were minor offenses from stealing farm animals and livestock to feed his 10 siblings.
When he was 15 years old, Dorancel moved to San Cristobal in Venezuela and began taking drugs and became alcoholic. He lived under a bridge where drug addicts, drunkards and beggars live. Due to his odd and absent-minded behavior, this led his parents to think that he is possessed by evil spirits.
Dorangel’s third arrest was in 1995 where was institutionalized for the murder of a fellow homeless man, Baltazar Cruz Moreno. The body of the victim was cannibalized and Dorangel was taken to the Institute of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Peribeca. He was then diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. For some reason, it was unknown whether he was released or he was able to escape the facility after 2 years and continued living his homeless life.
The Crimes
In 1998, Dorangel started killing and eating passersby on the streets. He used rocks and bamboo spears to knock his victims down. He chopped the bodies and kept the parts that he could cook and buried the feet, hands and heads. Since he is homeless and had nowhere to store the chopped body parts, they would decompose and he would need to kill again.
In February 1999, the Civil Defense found human remains of 2 men. Reports of missing people increased and aside from passersby, Dorangel also killed anyone who got drunk with him, even fellow homeless men. Further investigations led the authorities to discover 6 more bodies. At first, it was thought to be the doing of rival gangs. But the similarities to what happened in 1995 led to Dorangel being the suspect.
Dorangel became a historic figure for being the first serial killer in Venezuela.
Arrest
The authorities searched the nearby areas where the bodies were found and they discovered Dorangel’s gruesome shack. They saw several containers with human body parts ready to be used in recipes. Dorangel was finally captured that same day and the news of a cannibal eventually circulated.
Dorangel confessed to killing around 10 men between 30-40 years old. When asked why he only targets adult male, Dorangel said that women and children were too pure for consumption. He also said that he did not eat the feet because it causes indigestion. His favorite parts were the thighs, calves, and stomach. One chilling statement he delivered was when he compared eating human flesh to eating fruit.
Current Whereabouts
In 2016, there was a prison riot at the Tachira Police Station and Dorangel took this opportunity to kill and eat 2 of his fellow inmates. It was reported that the rest of the body parts were cooked and served to the rest of the inmates. Since Venezuela was undergoing economic and political crisis at that time, the investigation of the prison riot was soon forgotten.
As of mid 2020, Dorangel is still in the dungeons of Tachira Police for 21 years already. His legal status is unclear whether he had already served his sentence or not. There are no updates of his transfer to a different facility and he has already taken coronavirus tests. He is still in prison doing cleaning chores like what he had been doing before.
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